Environmental News Network

Scientists discover giant sperm fossilized in bat guano
In a cave in Australia, researchers from the University of New South Wales discovered giant fossilized sperm. The sperm were produced 17 million years ago by a group of tiny, shelled crustaceans called ostracods, making them the oldest fossilized sperm ever found. The results were published recently in Proceedings of the Royal Society B. The fossils were excavated in 1988, but it wasn't known they contained sperm until they were studied in detail by an ostracod expert last year. >> Read the Full Article
10,000-Gallons of Crude Oil Spilled in L.A.
Yesterday morning, black oil sprayed nearly 20 feet into the air in Atwater Village, a neighborhood in Los Angeles, California after a "valve malfunction" caused the oil to leak. The LA Fire Department (LAFD) estimates that 10,000 gallons have spilled and while much cleanup progress has been made, it will will take a few days to clean up all contamination. Crude oil was spilled across a half-mile area, according to an LAFD alert. The oil spill had created a pool approximately 40-feet wide and was knee-high in some areas. >> Read the Full Article
Patience, self-control and delayed gratification
How long would you wait for six grapes? A chimpanzee will wait more than two minutes to eat six grapes, but a black lemur would rather eat two grapes now than wait any longer than 15 seconds for a bigger serving. >> Read the Full Article
You Know the Ocean's in Trouble When Your Shell Starts Melting
Things are getting really dicey for a little ocean creature called a pteropod. Better known as the "sea butterfly," this delicate little sea snail is serving as an unfortunate bellwether of the deteriorating state of our oceans. Why? Conditions in the Antarctic ocean and along the West Coast of the U.S. have become so unnaturally acidic that the shells of sea butterflies are literally dissolving away. >> Read the Full Article
Overwhelming the Mississippi
New evidence from University of Texas at Austin researchers posit that the great Mississippi's natural ability to chemically filter out nitrates is being overwhelmed. UT's hydrologists demonstrate the enormity of the filtering process for almost every drop of water that enters into the 311,000-mile long course ending in the Gulf of Mexico. >> Read the Full Article
Bee booby-traps defend African farms from elephants
Wire fences booby-trapped with beehives are being built in five African countries to prevent elephants from raiding farms, while also providing local people with honey. 'Beehive fences' are now being put up in Botswana, Mozambique, Tanzania and Uganda by UK charity Save the Elephant, says Lucy King, leader of the Elephants and Bees Project in Kenya â€” and they are already in use at three communities in Kenya. >> Read the Full Article
Coral Reefs: Who's protecting whom?
According to a recent study, delicate coral reefs are protecting hundreds of millions of people around the world from stronger storms, rising seas, and flooding. The internationally supported study finds that coral reefs reduce the wave energy that would otherwise impact coastlines by 97 percent. >> Read the Full Article